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176 Garman and Worse were not so new-fangled as to build under cover; but Mr. Robson still thought that he would be ready by the appointed day, although the weather certainly was "the very devil!"

But the person who most of all anathematized the weather, and indeed the whole west coast, and everything that belonged to it, was our friend Mr. Aalbom. When he left his house in the morning, the wind and rain would persist in beating in his face, and when he came out of school, they were so obliging as to follow him right up again to his very door. When he had gone part of the way down the avenue, the wind managed to blow down on the top of his umbrella, which, after many struggles, it finally pressed down until his hat got jammed in among the ribs. Then all at once it began the same tactics from below, and blew up under the umbrella, and between the master's long legs, filling out the closely buttoned waterproof, until it bid fair to blow it away altogether.

All October and November went on much in the same fashion, and people who were given to jokes began to say that they had quite forgotten the sun's appearance.